A Brother's Concern
by tag.0
Summary: The day after Homura's winging, Mutsu receives some good news.


**A Brother's Concern**  
by tag

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Disclaimer: I do not own Sekirei; that honour belongs to Gokurakuin Sakurako and YG Comics.

**Author's Note**: Personal head-canon for this story is that the Sekirei who were on this ship were from a limited number of "greater flocks", and that the Lightning Twins are not the only genetic/biological siblings. Also, personal head-canon for _all_ my Sekirei stories is that the first Disciplinary Squad (Miya, Matsu, Kazehana, Mutsu, and sort of Karasuba) acted as older siblings (and in Miya's case mother) to the three younger Single Numbers (Homura, Akitsu, and Yume); Tsukiumi, of course, lived with her adjuster in the capital.

Beta-ed by Kryal and Vathara.

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"Mu-tsu!"

Oh no. He recognized that particular whine.

He put the book he'd been reading down on the end table next to the couch, and exchanged a glance with Akitsu – who had taken to joining Mikogami and himself in the office almost as soon as Mikogami had adopted her into their flock – and then looked at his Ashikabi.

"What is it, Mikogami?" he asked, in his best imitation of the hannya's tone of irritated patience. For _some_ reason, he'd found himself imitating her a _lot_ since he'd been winged.

"Why are you getting an email?" Mikogami demanded.

Mutsu blinked at that. "An email?" he repeated, standing up and crossing over to where Mikogami was sitting at his desk, his computer open in front of him.

"See!" Mikogami pointed to the screen, where his email program was open.

_ATTN: Mutsu_ was the subject header of the top one.

A quick glance at the field for the sender showed that the name was blanked out. And apparently there were attachments.

"Let's open it and see," Mutsu suggested mildly. "But I would be ready with an anti-virus program, just in case."

"Okay!"

Sometimes, his Ashikabi's curiosity and eagerness for new things could be more than a bit irritating.

The main body of the email came up, and Mutsu found himself blinking again.

_Little brother is all right. Our thanks to Akitsu for holding Uzume off long enough; it gave us time to arrive. —SE_MA02_

The attachments were pictures. One of them included a date and time in the photo – this morning – and showed Homura sound asleep on a bed, chest and neck bandaged, with a dark-haired young man – most probably the Ashikabi the hannya had taken in – sitting next to the bed, a few bandages decorating his own face. The other... clearly _someone_ had been hacking security cameras again, because the other looked like it had been taken last night, and showed the same dark-haired young man winging Homura.

Despite himself, a tension that he'd been feeling since they'd been forced to leave the confrontation last night, since he'd realized what Homura was likely to do as an alternative to being claimed by Higa, relaxed.

"Mutsu! Is that Number 06?" Mikogami demanded in a whine, interrupting his thoughts. "And isn't that the Sahashi jerk who got Yomi terminated? Who sent that?"

Mutsu snorted, glancing again at the signature. "The pervert," he replied coolly. Though he had to admit that he was glad Matsu had thought to let him know. "And yes, that's them. It looks like Number 06 managed to survive last night. _And_ avoid getting winged by Higa."

He didn't like to think what might have happened had Homura _not_ avoided that. Yes, Homura had stopped Mikogami from gathering as many Sekirei as his Ashikabi wanted – though Mutsu suspected that his little brother didn't really understand _why_ Mikogami gathered them. And he could certainly understand trying to prevent Yomi from dealing with unwinged fledges – something he'd pointed out to Mikogami any _number_ of times, to little effect. But as much as Homura had blocked Mikogami's efforts, he'd been even more ruthless in protecting the unwinged from Higa. And for good reason, from what Mutsu had gathered through Mikogami's information sources.

"Akitsu," he added, getting her attention. Even aside from Matsu's message, this was something she should know. According to a bit of digging Matsu had done a while before all of them had been forced to separate, back when the younger three had first been taken out of stasis, the fact that he, Homura, and Akitsu were in sequence was _not_ an accident. One of the reasons he'd been so pleased when Mikogami had decided to effectively adopt Akitsu, even though she couldn't be winged.

She gave him an openly questioning look.

"The pervert sends her thanks for holding off Number 10 last night. And Homura's all right. It appears he was winged by her Ashikabi."

Which... come to think of it, maybe he ought to pity Homura a bit for that. Having to deal with _both_ Matsu and Kazehana in his flock? That could _not_ be fun.

Akitsu's shoulders relaxed; it looked like she'd been as tense about the matter as he was. Of course, she knew the truth – he'd told it to her after the first time she and Homura had faced off against each other. She'd been extremely surprised that they were so evenly matched, considering everything that had happened to her.

"Mu-tsu! Who is this pervert you're talking about? What's going on?" Mikogami whined. "And what does it mean, '_little brother'_? He's your younger brother? Why didn't you _tell_ me? Aah, I could have had him... why did you make us leave?"

"It's not important, Mikogami. You can erase the email now," Mutsu replied, turning away and heading back to the couch. He had a book to finish reading.

But even as he settled down next to his little sister – and put himself into the 'ignore Mikogami's whining for the next hour' mindset, because he _knew_ his Ashikabi was just going to continue to whine about not getting Homura and Sahashi being the one to wing him – he spared one more thought for Homura. _Good luck, little brother._


End file.
